So, How many years does it take in Strawberry production to even begin to pay back the costs for that one "gutter"? I Bought Aluminum gutter sections for $3.00 each and attached them to the walls of my greenhouse and made Styrofoam rafts to grow my strawberries hydroponically for about $ 7.00 per 10 foot section and repaid myself in production two years after installation. Some people fail to take in consideration the startup costs in relation to the overall profit. If the costs take 10 years to recover, why bother with the overkill method? We have strayed too far from our ancestors common sense when applied to food production to the point of being ridiculous.
I am interested to try this but simplified a bit.... Given that you dont need much space for water run I dont see the importance of A)styrofoam B) the drain tube-surly the shape of the gutter would be enough? C) Plastic liner.... If you dont have styrofoam you dont need to protect it......
HI May i know the Volume of Substrate per meter until you settle everything, how many litres and if may i know what is the weight per meter with plants and well watered or fully saturated media while planting and what is the maximum weight per meter when fruits and at its peak production as whole how much does it weigh. Secondly what is the spacing of the supports for the gutter., Thanks in advance
cost of production seem to be higher than the value of the product and this method work in developed societies better than developing ones since there is enough virgin land
Isn't a peat-based substrate (peat compost, in other words) a non-replenishable resource? No new peat is being made by nature, basically. Here in the UK we are encouraged to avoid peat-based composts. Gardeners and horticulturalists are getting converted to freshly-made compost, derived from recycled vegetable waste. Is your coir/peat/perlite mix able to be recycled? Or is it just tossed out, after cropping? Just wondering, because I recently saw a mini-greens producer on RU-vid who had worked out a way to re-use his substrate, and I know coir (aka cocopeat) is a popular medium in that sector too, as it's "clean"; it isn't a contaminating soil type on those very small (mini-green) plant stems. However, I do feel concern for the ethical aspects of coir regarding water scarcity in India/Sri Lanka and water needs for coconut production there, and the threat to worker safety of inhaling the microfibres. Wearing protective kit is very uncomfortable in those climes. So, overall, is peat sustainable? Come to that, is coir a really long-term sustainable and ethical option for food production? The alternative, of course, is the raw sodbusters' earth, but that aside, should we be looking at other alternatives than peat and coir?
interesting questions. Other potential substrate components have their own drawbacks: straight perlite can be unforgiving to grow in, and wood fiber needs more research. Hemp fiber shows promise in the distant future, given the new US Farm Bill, but needs more research also. Imho the real environmental drawback of coir comes from shipping to the north rather than from competition with food crops. Coir fiber and dust are byproducts of coconut grown for food/oil/lumber, while other plants/animals are often raised among the trees. The competition for fresh water might come from washing the fiber, but this can be fixed.
+Candide Thirtythree If this helps, there might be a clue behind this rational: Walmart can buy the same product from a Mexican greenhouse for 4/5 less. That said, it would be interesting to have a segment on the market conditions including capital and start-up. Most growers on the US side of the Southwest will agree that once a technology can be supplanted south the labor costs and other agency issues result in a more profitable return. They should have filmed this in central Mexico.
@@jimcameron9848 The Arizona program has some rough figures at: cals.arizona.edu/strawberry/Hydroponic_Strawberry_Information_Website/Costs.html..... it is only a guideline since there are so many variables in market and in individual management, of course.
Rene, you probably have the answer by now, but yes, Sun#3 is peat/vermiculite substrate. But it is designed for seed germination and very small cells. A courser fiber with no vermiculite is better for the troughs.
Ridiculous amount of effort. Simply, take gutters, drill holes in bottom, fill gutters with leaf and regular compost, plant strawberries. Water, harvest strawberries.
